Supply Chains

The rise of corporate power and the decline in workers’ rights, wages and secure work are directly correlated. Governments are captured by corporations who dictate policy and regulation on nearly every aspect of our lives.

Labour is not a commodity: this principle is at the very heart of the ILO Constitution. Yet the global web of supply chains operates on this basis. Corporate power, profit and exploitation of labour and natural resources increasingly depend on this impoverished model of trade – global supply chains, a global trade which keeps millions of workers in poverty and precarious work.

More than 60 per cent of global trade is dependent on contracts in supply chains sourced from different parts of the world.

It is the real economy where working people are exploited through supply chains that are based on denial of human and labour rights, poverty wages and insecure or precarious work. It is a model that ruthlessly exploits the labour of women and migrants.

Under the umbrella of the logo ‘End Corporate Greed’, unions are organising for minimum living wages and collective bargaining, more secure and safe employment relationships, formalising informal work in supply chains, purging supply chains of slavery and universal social protection.

Supply Chains•News

Unions warn that further abuses are in sight following the extension of martial law in the Philippines’ southern island of Mindanao. At the request of President Rodrigo Duterte, direct military control has been extended until the end of 2019.

Workers across the globe are struggling to make ends meet, believe their jobs are insecure and don’t believe their voices matter in politics according to a new global public opinion poll from the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC).

The ITUC, the Clean Clothes Campaign (CCC) and the HEC-NYU EU Public Interest Clinic have today filed a formal complaint with the European Ombudsman. The labour rights organisations claim the European Commission is not taking into account its human rights obligations regarding trade policies towards Bangladesh, and is not transparent about doing so.

This year marks the 10th anniversary of the World Day for Decent Work (WDDW), which will fall on 7 October. This year, the global focus is on the world struggle for living minimum wages and a pay rise for all workers.

The decision by Brazil’s corruption-riddled parliament to eliminate a swathe of protections in the country’s labour laws will impoverish millions of people and leave workers completely at the mercy of employers who will have unilateral power to set wages, holiday entitlements, working hours and bonuses.